Despite not getting paid by Monster, the surfer claims he “repeatedly saw Monster’s advertising prominently featuring Florence’s name and likeness without [his] authorization, including while in the presence of others, causing Florence to experience embarrassment, humiliation and emotional distress,” according to the suit. | Photo: WSL

Under the deal, Florence — who has starred in surfer flicks including “View From a Blue Moon” and the recent video “Space” — agreed to promote Monster drinks for $350,000 a year plus $150,000 toward a marketing production that recounted his pursuit of his world surfing title, court records show.

Nevertheless, Monster “has refused to pay any amount whatsoever under the 2017 agreement,” according to the suit.

That’s despite the fact that Monster has plastered Florence all over “its websites, social media channels, and in print and digital ad campaigns,” according to Florence’s suit.

Monster, meanwhile, counters that Florence hid “material facts” during contract talks. The company didn’t elaborate, but claims it “would not have signed the contract if Monster had known such representations by Florence were false.”

Earlier this year — well after the Monster contract was signed — Florence tore his ACL and hasn’t surfed competitively since.

It couldn’t be learned whether the ACL injury was a bone of contention between Florence and Monster.

Despite not getting paid by Monster, the surfer claims he “repeatedly saw Monster’s advertising prominently featuring Florence’s name and likeness without [his] authorization, including while in the presence of others, causing Florence to experience embarrassment, humiliation and emotional distress,” according to the suit.

Florence likewise claims that the Monster relationship has been a series of broken promises and last-minute switches to the contract.

After getting lavish promises from Monster’s sports marketing executive, Tim English — including an emailed pledge for retroactive pay in the three-year deal — Florence says Monster sent a longer-form version with watered-down pay provisions.

In response, Monster blames Florence’s woes, without elaborating, on his “failure to exercise reasonable care and diligence.”

In September, a judge declined to dismiss Florence’s suit. Attorneys for Florence and Monster are slated to meet on Wednesday for a conference hearing in Riverside County (Calif.) Superior Court.

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From the milk-a-story-bone-dry Department: G-Mac and Nazare back in The New York Times!

I am not an expert in surfing. I am not an expert in technique, in wave forecasting, in critical analysis, in board building, in surf travel. I am not an expert in surf history, in competition, in judging, in reading a wave. I am not an expert in anything but turning one surf story into three, four, five, even infinite. I am an expert in Mick Fanning, Ashton Goggans, Paul Speaker, Backward Fin Beth etc.

And I thought I was the best in the world at this but I am not. Garrett McNamara beats me like a drum. He kicks me like a dead horse and he is back, once again, with wall-to-wall coverage of Nazare.

You saw him on CNN with Anderson Cooper, again, and I thought it was a replay from years ago but it was fresh and today he is in The New York Times, saving the little Portuguese fishing village from the monster waves that used to terrify them and let’s read just a touch, just a smidgen.

NAZARÉ, Portugal — At the market in the ancient fishing village of Nazaré, Portuguese pensioners shopped for their fruit and vegetables. Retired fishermen chatted over coffee. And a record-breaking American surfer sipped on a cucumber and celery smoothie.

It was Garrett McNamara, a 51-year-old from Hawaii who until recently held the world record for the highest wave ever surfed. And who, for most of his life, had never visited Europe and had to take some time to find Portugal on a map.

“I never envisaged this,” said Mr. McNamara, who tended to surf in the Pacific Ocean. “Portugal was never a destination.”

For centuries, Nazaré was a traditional seaside town, where fishermen taught their children to avoid the huge waves that crashed against the nearby cliffs. But over the past eight years, those same waves have turned the place into an unlikely draw for extreme surfers like Mr. McNamara, their fans and the global companies that sponsor the athletes.

Etc. Etc. And you know the rest of the story because you’ve read/seen it 100 times, 1000 times, infinite times.

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"A rugged new watch that should hit aquatically-inclined horological obsessives like a gigantic wave!"

From modest little Cocoa Beach in Brevard County, Florida, to the dizzying heights of the world tour and, finally, the bright lights of Lemoore, California, Kelly’s star has shone over us for thirty years.

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Yesterday, while the world’s leaders gathered in France under grey skies to honor World War I’s fallen heroes, a sleeper cell of easily triggered social justice warriors was activated in BeachGrit‘s Instagram account and delivered a staggering rout.

At issue was a photo taken from the cult classic film Surf Nazis Must Die. The girl wore a swastika on her cheek and declared that she needed a vacation.

Fury raged in the comments with follower after follower declaring they would unfollow while shaming BeachGrit for being thoughtless, rude and terrible and then, like that, Instagram swung in and vanished the post like it never existed, leaving only a cryptic message in its place.

We removed your post because it doesn’t follow our Community Guidelines on violence or threat of violence. If you violate our guidelines again, your account may be restricted or disabled.

We want to keep Instagram a safe place for everyone, and we created these guidelines to support and protect our diverse community on Instagram.

We remove photos or videos of extreme graphic violence.

we remove oats that encourage violence or attacks on anyone based on their religious, ethnic or sexual background.

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From the heart-an-empty-hole Department: Surfline plays the role of Mr. Grinch this holiday season!

This morning arch-conservative (in its political leanings not wave measurements) surf forecasting website Surfline delivered its Christmas calculation and it is very bah humbug if you are the sort that craves big waves and/or craves watching big waves.

Are you that sort? Are you like the World Surf League President-elect of Content, Media and WSL Studios who is in Fiji right now (I think) at #kalamakamp surfing the monster waves of his young life?

“It’s a really tough very long range/winter forecast in the North Pacific, in what has been a peculiar past five to six years. As mentioned above, weak to moderate El Nino’s are all over the place in terms of North Pacific surf (and West Coast precipitation). Add the anomalously warm water in the Gulf of Alaska and it doesn’t make me feel great about our surf on the West Coast this winter (especially Southern California).”

“If I had to give a prediction, I would say first and foremost, it’s very low confidence — Southern California will be below average for surf size, we’ll probably see warmer than average air temps, and more days than normal of light wind/clean conditions. Northern California may also see smaller than normal surf and below average number of XXL days…”

We are apparently in a weak El Nino and this of course means no big waves for you and it also means no big waves for John John Florence and Kelly Slater at the just-around-the-corner Billabong Pipeline Pro in Honor of Andy Irons.